About three hundred civilians displaced by fighting between armed groups have returned to their homes in Namtu Township.

A local, who doesn’t wish to give his name, reported to SHAN that villagers from Kon Kayar and Sin Li, who were staying in the Pobayong Buddhist monastery in Namtu town, went home on the morning of 5 October.

”They returned to their villages because there had been no recent clashes in their area.”

The villagers stayed at the monastery for only seven days after fleeing fighting between the Burma Army and the Kachin Independence Army and the People’s Defence Force.

IDPs in Numtu township

However, fighting continues in neighbouring Mantong Township, which is only 14 miles from the two villages, and it’s now causing residents from Mantong town to flee to Namtu Township.

“Yesterday, a civilian house in Mantong Township was damaged by Burma Army shelling and today fighting is still going on,” the man reported to SHAN.

Meanwhile, a government official has instructed people who fled fighting in both of the townships in 2016 to return to their homes by 15 October.